Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the launch of an international UN investigation into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict very badly. – Jacques Witt
A decision hailed by Hamas and denounced by the Israeli government. On Thursday, the UN Human Rights Council voted to launch an international investigation. This will focus on the human rights abuses committed in the occupied Palestinian territories and in Israel since April, but also on the “root causes” of the tensions.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately denounced a “shameful decision” which “encourages terrorists around the world”. On the other hand, the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip, “welcomed” the decision of the Human Rights Council.
The investigation voted by 24 votes against 9 and 14 abstentions
Earlier, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, argued before the Council, meeting in extraordinary session, that the recent Israeli strikes on Gaza could constitute war crimes “if they ‘turns out’ that civilians were affected ‘indiscriminately’. Michelle Bachelet had also underlined that the firing of thousands of rockets by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas “do not distinguish between military and civilian objects, and their use therefore constitutes a clear violation of international humanitarian law”.
The meeting, which focused on human rights abuses in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, was organized at the request of Pakistan, as coordinator of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, and Palestinian authorities. A resolution adopted with 24 votes in favor, 9 against and 14 abstentions, launches an “independent and permanent international commission of inquiry” to examine the violations of international humanitarian law and human rights that led to recent Israeli tensions. Palestinian.
From May 10 to 21, 254 Palestinians were killed by Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip, including 66 children and fighters, according to local authorities. In Israel, rocket fire from Gaza killed 12 people, including a child, a teenage girl and a soldier, according to police.
Collect evidence
The scope of the resolution goes far beyond the recent conflict. The text requests that the commission study “all the root causes of recurrent tensions, instability and the prolongation of the conflict, including discrimination and systematic repression based on national, ethnic, racial or religious affiliation”. She said she had seen no evidence of the presence of armed groups or military action in buildings targeted by Israel in Gaza, one of the Jewish state’s justifications for destroying them.
The investigation should focus on establishing the facts and collecting evidence and material that could be used in legal proceedings and, to the extent possible, identifying the culprits so that they can be tried.
This commission of inquiry is a first
This is the first time that the Council has set up a commission of inquiry with an indefinite mandate. The mandate of other commissions, such as the one on Syria, must be renewed every year. Some countries, such as France, have lamented that the commission’s mandate is “too broad” and its objective “too indeterminate”, but the resolution has garnered broad support from African and Latin American countries.
The Israeli Prime Minister sees in this vote the confirmation of “the flagrant anti-Israel obsession of the Human Rights Council”. Israel is the only country with a fixed item on the agenda for each Council session, one of the reasons why the United States, under President Donald Trump, had left the organization. New President Joe Biden has brought the United States back as an observer country.